Resource · Toolkit · Strategy · M&A, Partnerships and Market Entry
Bridging Generations: the Family Business Toolkit
A playbook for business families and their advisers, built on six stages that put the route and the rules before the people: Baseline, Route, Institutions, Develop, Glide, Endure. Every module is summarised here, and the working files download straight after a short form.
Get the working files
What is inside
6 stages, 11 modules, 15 templates.
Baseline, Route, Institutions, Develop, Glide and Endure: the modules follow the stages in the order you would use them, with an opening group before them and an appendix after.
- Modules 00, 01, 02Before you startWhat the toolkit is for, why business families need their own playbook, and the BRIDGE arc.
- Module 03BaselineAgree where the family and the business stand, and put the emergency basics in place.Templates T01
- Module 04RouteChoose the ownership form and the owner strategy before naming a successor.Templates T02
- Modules 05, 06InstitutionsWrite the rules for ownership, money, jobs and governance, and make them binding.Templates T03, T04, T05, T06, T07, T08, T09
- Module 07DevelopPrepare willing, able successors and informed owners, over years.Templates T10
- Module 08GlideChoose the successor by a stated process and hand over on a set date.Templates T11, T12, T13
- Module 09EndureReview, repair and renew the arrangements, so the bridge keeps standing.Templates T14, T15
- Module 10AppendixThe three tools in brief, the templates, the legal and tax checklist, the EDON defaults and the references.
Get the working filesAll 11 modules as PDF and 15 templates, 2 of them Excel workbooks, straight after a short form.
The modules, stage by stage
Before you start
What the toolkit is for, why business families need their own playbook, and the BRIDGE arc.
Orientation
What the toolkit is for and how to read it: owners and board members in about 20 minutes a module, advisers in full. It also introduces the Arlens, the fictional business family that runs through every module.
Why business families need their own playbook
The three circles of family, ownership and business; what the evidence says about family influence and about choosing a leader by birth; how the family's emotional stake shapes risk; and the myths against the numbers that matter.
The BRIDGE arc
Why the route and the rules come before the people; the six stages and how long they take; the four lanes of ownership, leadership, family and wealth; the emergency track; and the gate and fallback at each stage.
Baseline
Agree where the family and the business stand, and put the emergency basics in place.
Baseline
Where the family and the business stand today: the three clocks of ownership, family and business, the family's influence profile, who counts as family, twelve warning signs and the emergency basics for the first month.
Emergency basics Template · Word
Who acts and what they may decide if a leader is suddenly lost, with contacts, key documents, an up-to-date will and communication within 48 hours.
Route
Choose the ownership form and the owner strategy before naming a successor.
Route
Six routes for the future ownership form, from keeping it to selling all; what the evidence says about survival and growth; the fit test; the owner strategy on one page; and the fallback named in advance.
Owner strategy one-pager Template · Word
The owners' purpose, two priority goals, the financial guardrails and how much the family can afford to lose, agreed on one page.
Institutions
Write the rules for ownership, money, jobs and governance, and make them binding.
Institutions, part 1: ownership, agreements and money
Written rules for ownership, money and jobs: what fair means, ownership design, holding vehicles, the shareholder agreement, exit routes and liquidity, dividends set from the growth target, and the family employment policy.
Institutions, part 2: family governance, constitution and board
Family forums that grow with the family, the line between council, board and management, which document to write first, a constitution drafted by two generations and made binding, the board path, the independence test and professional management.
Fairness and ownership choices Template · Word
What fair means for the family, settled before anything is divided, and the ownership design that follows: who may own and who controls.
Shareholder agreement checklist Template · Word
The clauses that make the rules binding, each marked in place, to draft or not needed: transfer limits, exit windows, a valuation formula, payment terms and deadlock.
Dividend rule calculator Template · Excel
Sets the dividend from the growth target: growth capacity is return on equity times the share of profit kept. With the fictional Arlen case as a worked example.
Family employment policy Template · Word
Entry criteria, open vacancies, market pay and reporting lines for family members, written before the next family member applies.
Family meeting agenda Template · Word
A standing agenda for family meetings, from family news and the CEO's report on the business to ownership and the next generation, with who leads each item.
Constitution chapter map and mirror table Template · Word
Tracks each chapter of the family constitution and shows where every conflict-prone rule must also sit, in the shareholder agreement or the articles.
Independence test Template · Word
Tests whether a proposed director is truly independent: business ties, family ties, fees, tenure and who nominated them.
Develop
Prepare willing, able successors and informed owners, over years.
Develop
Willing, able successors and informed owners: planning for the case with no willing heir, why an heir joins, engaging the whole next generation, outside experience, a development path with real responsibility and a one-page plan.
Successor development plan Template · Word
One page per candidate: goals, roles and assignments, a mentor, outside experience, feedback and the phase test with its date.
Glide
Choose the successor by a stated process and hand over on a set date.
Glide
The handover itself: the order of a transfer, choosing the successor by a stated process, how leaders leave, the authority ladder, communication, the price gap, financing, sale routes, and the legal and tax checklist.
Selection scorecard Template · Excel
Scores every candidate, family or not, against the same profile; the board decides and the family council is consulted.
Authority ladder Template · Word
Moves authority from the senior to the successor step by step, for each kind of decision, to a fixed end date with no return.
Legal and tax checklist Template · Word
Eight questions to check early with your own advisers, wherever you are, and to settle last: inheritance rules, transfer tax, family business law and company clauses.
Endure
Review, repair and renew the arrangements, so the bridge keeps standing.
Endure
After the handover: reviews at set times and at major life events, the conflict ladder, telling simple disputes from complex ones, twenty warning signs, keeping family wealth apart from the company, philanthropy and renewal.
Post-handover review Template · Word
The agenda for reviewing the handover after two to three years, and again at the CEO's tenure review at ten years.
Conflict ladder Template · Word
The family's agreed steps for conflict, one rung at a time: prevent, detect, talk, facilitate, mediate and arbitrate. Court comes last.
Appendix
The three tools in brief, the templates, the legal and tax checklist, the EDON defaults and the references.
Appendix: tools, templates, checklist and references
The three tools in brief, the fifteen templates and where each is used, the legal and tax checklist, the six EDON defaults where the sources disagree, the thirteen numbers behind the argument, and the references.
Get the working files
All eleven modules as PDF, and the fifteen templates: thirteen Word documents and two Excel workbooks, the dividend rule calculator and the selection scorecard. Leave your name and work email and the download page opens straight away.
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